Bulking without increasing my carb intake more

OP, as a full time student, do you have access to a nutritionist? Maybe the school has a nutritional science, exercise science, or nursing department which can provide some insight into how to meet your goals.

It's a lot more complicated when you're type 1 diabetic as you have to maintain a fine balance with your blood sugar and insulin levels. You really need to speak with your team, particularly your endocrinologist and dietician, to work out the right regime for you so you're not wasting your time.

And don't take no for an answer if they tell you that you shouldn't bulk. Explain to them how important it is, and that you're willing to do whatever it takes to do it in a safe way. Worst case, find a physician who understands and is willing to work with you. Most are pushing weight loss instead of gain. But a good doc should understand how challenging it can be for type 1 diabetics to maintain a healthy BMI and gain weight...due to the diet restrictions.

I don't have diabetes, but I'm lucky enough to have a physician who understands that gaining weight in this way is important to me, and who is encouraging me to do it and is supportive of me getting into better shape in the long run. This physician works with a lot of people with diabetes.

There are also others who have done this; I know there are.

You shouldn't have a problem with your team (hopefully). Most doctors will support muscle building as the more muscle you have, the better your glucose control - although you will probably find their protein suggestions low, due to potential kidney issues.

But many people, including physicians, aren't aware of "bulking"...even those who do weight training themselves. Just as in the general population, there aren't many people aware of it.

Most people are intuitively aware of the "recomp". But this strategy won't work for someone with a low bodyfat percentage. The closest equivalent for such a person is a "lean bulk".

That said, any physician worth their degree knows that in order to gain weight, a person has to eat more. It's just the idea of convincing certain people that gaining weight can be a good thing, which is the tricky part. I once had a physician tell me when I was in high school and was 152 lbs and 6% body fat, that my ideal weight was 147. Not only was he wrong...this was bad advice.

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OP: If confronted with this, you just have to stick to your guns and tell them you want to gain weight in a healthy way, need a bit more protein because of your workouts, and are concerned about the fact that you may have to increase carbs at some point.

But it sounds like you have a good handle on how to proceed with it for now.

Your carb intake should be fine to bulk. Not ideal, but you have to deal with the hand you are dealt.

Though with a somewhat lowish carb intake (for bulking), you'll probably want to be less aggressive with a surplus.

In reality you aren't talking about that big of differences between moderate bulking and normal eating for everyone else, a few hundred cals over maintenance is not weird at all, everybody that isn't cutting (losing weight) does it regularly, the only difference with bulking is that you do it every day. You're not talking about some extreme eating state.

Plenty of athletes have successfully managed it.

And if you are going to spend some time googling type 1 diabetes and bulking, be aware that you are going to find that insulin is used as a PED same as testosterone and HGH. Don't go down that road, it is very dangerous (assuming that you take insulin for your diabetes).

As to your question about good foods....I would stick with your current carb intake/foods and add fats/protein. Bacon is always a good choice.

your best bet then would to increase fats. if you are bulking you need to be in a calroie surplus and getting it from fats can be really easy. for example each carb and protein is 4 calories when fat is 9! so if you eat a lot more fats you will not have to increase your carbs as much so you can still bulk. eat a lot more mono and polysaturated fats that are found in things like olive oil,almonds mixed nuts, and much more. good luck man!